A ONE-DAY strike planned by South Africa's Congress of Trade Unions has driven the country's currency to an all-time low and threatens to disrupt the government's painstaking progress towards a new constitution.
The Congress of Trade Unions in South Africa (Cosatu) says its 1.3 million members will strike next Tuesday in protest at a number of clauses in the draft constitution. It is particularly upset at a proposal from right-wingers to include the right to lock employees out of their workplace as a balance to the right to strike.
Battered by a series of rumours since February, the rand dropped to a new low of 4.38 against the dollar yesterday before recovering slightly in afternoon trade.
Dealers on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange said the further decline stemmed from concern over the planned one-day strike on April 30th and from demand by importers for dollars.
The Cosatu action is officially supported by the ruling African National Congress, a close ally from the days of the anti-apartheid struggle. Ironically, it comes at a time when the new ANC Finance Minister, Mr Trevor Manuel, is touring international financial capitals to woo investors.
President Nelson Mandela told journalists yesterday that he was sure the rand would recover and that foreign investors would see Cosatu's action in its historical context, as black workers striving to gain parity with whites.
The strike has been bitterly criticised by most of the opposition parties and by South African business, which described it as an unnecessary muscle-flexing exercise that would badly damage the economy.
"We think this strike is totally inappropriate. It will do tremendous harm to investment here and overseas, and we can ill afford it when the rand is at its lowest ever", Mrs Janet Dickman of the South African Chamber of Business said. "This may have been necessary in the past, but not now. It creates a poor perception of our commitment to democracy.
The new constitution, intended as a blueprint for a new, multi-racial South Africa, is to be debated this week so that it can be formally adopted by the May deadline.
Yesterday the general secretary of Cosatu, Mr Sam Shilowa, said that his movement would continue protests beyond that date if the lock-out clause were not dropped, along with proposals to guarantee property rights, allow single-language schools and devolve labour policy to provincial level.